In The Bleak Midwinter

At the start of this month, I was sat in a log cabin by a loch. The rest of England was jamming twitter, remarking that it was so windy they'd seen their car drift by the patio. I was snug.

It was my boyfriend's idea. He quite fancied going up to Fort William - and it turned out to be a lovely thing to do. The sleeper train leaves at 9pm and gets in at 9am which means you can actually enjoy getting drunk in the buffet car, rather than crawling into a rattling bed at 2am, and staggering hatefully out of it a 7am cursing your head and the civet cat's piss coffee. Instead, come 8am we were sat eating croissants and chugging through snowy mountains.

Using the internet, I'd arranged for a taxi to take us to that castle by Loch Ness you see in the postcards. It seemed like "A Thing To Do". It was all dour fun, in its own bleak way, but you can probably imagine what four hours in a cab were like when the driver's opening gambit was "No, don't get me started on politics..."

It was like a primer on Scottish Political Theory, mixed in with some caustic remarks about how hard it was to find employment in the area if you've done "a wee bit of youthful GBH", and a couple of laden remarks about how nice it was when English people paid a tip. There was also a very long silence after he asked "Are you two... brothers?".

Anyway, two days sat in a log cabin, walking along the shores of a loch until you could chew the rain, and then back home for soup. I think that's what's nice about being old and happy.

The Free Man

Spent a lovely week in Portmeirion.

I was fascinated by Clough Williams-Ellis, the village's creator. He comes across as carefully eccentric - everything about the place was invented, even the name (it was originally called something like Chilly Mouth, but Clough picked something a bit grander, but couldn't quite decide on a pronunciation).

Clough built it on a patch of land near an Uncle's estate, and made the most out of the microclimate, creating England's first purpose-built holiday village. Royalty came, Noel Coward wrote Blithe Spirit there, everyone was charmed by the basket-weaving hermit in the woods. It was a nice little folly that Clough picked away at in between proper work.

Then the bombshell dropped. The resort was actually making a lot of money. Wife and daughter tactfully realised that, as it was a business, it should behave like one. The dour cheese-pairing hotel manageress was replaced with a flamboyant man with a parrot called Agatha who worked the guests with charm.

Portmeirion already had a shop, but the takings tended to disappear - this was probably related to the discovery that the charming Moroccan barman slept there at nights. Instead, private garages in the villas were done away with, replaced with shops. But what were the shops to sell? Clough's daughter had a brainwave and invented Portmeirion Pottery, which soon became an internationally famous Welsh pottery brand. Curious, as she had it all shipped in from Stoke-on-Trent.

Clough was a great proponent of proper town design. Stalin offered him the role of his chief town planner, but Clough was disturbed by how much he liked the great dictator and instead contented himself with creating Stevenage. He did more than anyone else to create laws for listed buildings and planning permission - but at the same time made sure he was able to work without them at Portmeirion. Similarly, he established the Snowdownia National Park to preserve the Welsh countryside... but ensured that its borders skirted around Portmeirion.

There is a convenient fiction that it was originally established as an artisan's community, but it was always a holiday resort, and one that daytrippers flocked to. The entry price fluctuated according to demand, with a sign outside saying "In order to discourage visitors, the entry price today is __. If you wish to avoid this impost, kindly turn around".

The idea for a holiday resort was ripped off by Billy Butlin, who established a cheap-n-cheery version at Pwllheli. This was requisitioned from him during the war, and afterwards the Pwllheli town council used Clough's planning laws in order to block its reopening. They'd never cared for Butlins, and invited Clough along to the subsequent enquiry - Butlin had nicked his idea and built a tawdry resort, surely he'd be against it? Instead, Clough announced pointed out that Butlins' customers had been through a horrible war and surely they deserved a holiday? To each according to his need, and all that...

Mind you, when Clough discovered the trustees of his Uncle's estate was planning on turning the castle bordering Portmeirion into a home for wayward youth, the businessman in him swiftly decided it would be much better as another hotel.

Clough was a Welsh noble of a certain era that never actually spoke the language. Nowadays the resort is proudly Welsh and staffed by the nicest, most crisply-efficient people you could wish to meet. It's also baking hot in February. Which is surely impossible, but also beautiful.

Loch

The really amazing thing about Loch Lomond is that it's under an hour from Glasgow. Compare this to my flat in London - with a bit of luck I'd be in Penge or East Croydon.

Just to point out, Loch Lomond looks like this, only prettier:

Other than that, there's not really much to say about the last few days. They've been lovely. And just occasionally, very very cold.

Hopefully, my next trip up here should include: The steam train to Fort William, the GlasGay Festival, and a foam party at the Polo Lounge. Followed by hypothermia on the walk home.

In which I get a girlfriend.

"Hi! I'm Lauren! What you doing?"

I am sitting smoking in the rain. This is what you do in Edinburgh.

"All alone? I'm with my mates. You could do with some company."

That's terribly kind, although honestly there's really no...

"My boyfriend dumped me on Valentine's Day. Don't go there. Six years it was, but there we go and since then it's been brilliant. Honest, I've spent the whole time hanging with my gay flatmate. Gay bars are brilliant. My mum's dead worried that I'll catch lesbianism off of them, but no, mum, I say, it's not like AIDS, you can't pick it up just from hanging around them, no the only thing I've got from those gay boys is a love of the cock."

Er. Er. Er.

She takes a cigarette and smiles. "Am I forward? Do you think I am? It's my heart on my sleeve and my love of cock, that's what it is. I'm just off to the bar." And she winks and goes away.

I blink. Her friends lean over. One is called Sally. She's all smiles. The other is called Ginny. She is glowering at me. We talk aboout the trams and the weather. And then Sally says, "Look - sorry, but you're not gay are you?"

Yes, yes I am.

"I knew it!" groans Ginny, disgusted. "Another one."

Sally shakes her head. "It keeps happening. She's spent so much time around them homosexuals she just hits on them." A delicate pause. "You know, she is very good looking..."

Well yes, she is. But no.

Sally smiles kindly. "Just nip off to the loo when she gets back and we'll let her down gently. And whatever you do, don't take her for chips."

Ginny shakes her head wearily.

Fringed

What is the point of mobile broadband? In five year's time will we laugh at them as much as minidisc recorders? On the thick stones of Edinburgh the little beggar has given up, which is why i'm typing gamely away in a cafe/laptop farm full of fierce-faced people stabbing self-importantly away.

I am very happy, however. To write Harry Potter, JK Rowling booked the penthouse of Edinburgh's finest hotel. I am penning my latest book in an apartment above a gay sauna. It's as lovely as can be - although the air does whiff of chlorine and farts.

In between flailing away at my wordcount, I am seeing STUFF. Mostly wonderful stuff. I am not trying too hard. This morning I walked past some student actors in Elizabethan skirts bouncing up and down singing a warm-up song about bananas. I checked the crowd to see if there were any pretty boys. There were not - just a slightly flushed, overweight boy surrounded by a lot of girls with pinched faces and the make-up of 50 year-olds screaming "Banana! This is how we peel the banana!". So I decided it was safe to hate them and move on.

I've deliberately avoided seeing any Token Gay Plays, but did go and see a comic called Jimmy McGhie on the basis that he looked pretty in the flyer. He told nice jokes and his shirt kept riding up, which made up for the fact that Future Husband Rhod Gilbert was sold out. There was also a suicidal Welsh transvestite sing-a-long called Sue which was brilliant. There we are.

Apart from theatre and comedy there's also the joy of trying to use the Fringe Website which has the kind of woeful search engine you hope St Peter will use when it comes to judgment day ("Well, I'm typing in 'sodomy' and all it's offering me are tickets to a short film...").

At night (which in Edinburgh appears to start at about 1 am) I am finding the gay scene oddly flat. I'm either blaming the smoking ban or my indigestion, but it's peculiarly lifeless. There's a new barclubbar called "GHQ" which looks a little too imposing to even try and drink in. CeCeBlooms still has checkerboard tiles on which florid women are whirled around to Kylie by whip-thin dancing boys. As I'm getting older I'm noticing I'm edging further and further away from the dry ice and towards the slot machines and the scowling pensioners who sit there letting off 2a.m. farts.

Other than that, I dunno. It's kind of brilliant, really. I've also been watching Quatermass 2 again. It's a gift that keeps on giving, especially at scrapy-o-clock when you're utterly, utterly smashed and really just need to hear a women with plums rammed between all of her cheeks crisple enunciate "Johnny! Johnny! What's Happened To You! Is it the Amonids? Johnny?" Bliss.

Thought for the day

Why are two singles never cheaper?

On air

The flight out of Perpignan airport was horrible. The plane banked towards a mountain and then flipped towards the sea. Screaming children went quiet. "Finally," I thought, "I get why flying is scary." It was the first week in September 2001.

Since then I've flown rarely. My flight to Australia was the first time in three years, and I found the whole thing horrible. I spent the last seven hours on the flight back rigid with fear. Air travel has been described as moments of terror followed by hours of tedium, but I am perfectly capable of sitting rigid with fear for seven hours. I even watched Twilight thinking "please don't let me die while watching this".

But I landed. And I thought "Well, that was terrible. But flying's actually pretty safe."

And then that Air France flight went missing. And the news yesterday was full of experts saying "Well, even if X happpened, then there's always system Y, or, in an emergency, there's an onboard windmill that will power the thing, or failing that, it can actually fly without engines for half an hour at least...."

And you think "yeah, right. That didn't help all the poor people on board." It's the kind of news that makes you shudder. I can hear about other stories and feel for the victims, but every time I hear about a plane crash, there's the sympathy, followed by a big portion of "next time, that'll be me". Cos I'm a selfish, scared bugger.

Of course, the media doesn't help by immediately running off to an airport to film hysterical relatives. When on earth did that become acceptable footage?

UPDATE: No, BBC News, What's Being Said On The Web isn't really valid reporting, either is it? Of course, let's rush to give a forum poster wider airing for this gem: "Could it be possible that the aircraft was kidnapped by aviation knowledgeable people, forced the crew to send the "automatic" message and then continued in silence to land somewhere in the enormous Amazonas region or in Africa? ". Would you run a "Send us your theories about what happened to Maddie" page?

Leaving Australia

As I leave Australia, I would like to say I've changed the country. Or it's changed me. But no. Not really. It has rained more than I'd expected. And the television is worse than you'd believe.

On my last night, Paul takes me to the local pub. There's a room of pokie slot machines, and there's a room for horse-racing betting. And there's a big screen tv showing an episode of Medium. A curly red-head in a tie-dye shawl is shouting at the screen "No! It can't be him! Oh Melissa!". The caption "To be continued" flashes up on the screen and the ginger woman howls: "No! They keep doing this! They can't do this to me!"

But the pub is mostly empty and the only answer comes from the ever-chipper pokie machines.

Paul and I stand watching The Footie Show. It's now missing its lead, Matty Johns, after all of the unfortunate gang-banging. But the show continues.

Matty Johns is a national icon in tatters. His autiobiography ("The Inside Story of Rugby" - curiously leaving out the group sex) is all over the bargain book stores. Worse, on the same edition of The Footie Show that he apologised for his sexual shenanigans, he also starred in a sketch which effectively said "Well, it could be worse, I could be gay." Curiously, Australia was unimpressed. So he's now Australia's biggest gang-banging homophobe.

In good news, however, all the stress has given him a haunted air and he now looks quite hot. Rather than like Rob Brydon's leftover chins. I'm just saying.

Anyway, the Footie Show is on, and a sketch has a cast member apologising for being late - he was at a strip show. "Hey man," says a colleague, "We don't do that any more."

"Hey! No worries!" he protests, "It was a male stripper!"

"Well, that's okay then." And it's all smiles. Hmmmn.

Cairns

Cairns is like being roasted in an oven that hasn't been cleaned. It's hot. It's tacky. Outside my hotel window a band is playing the Macarena followed by The Birdie Song.

Getting here was brilliant - the train took 32 hours through endless not-very-much. Occasionally we'd stop at a station surrounded by even less. On board was like a 70s Travelodge on wheels, with tutting pensioners, camp staff, and strange strange food ("Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, as we approach Townsville may we remind you that the buffet carriage is now open serving a range of teas, coffees, non alcoholic beverages and alcoholic beverages, sandwiches, wrapes and cookies-in-a-cup." Cookies in a cup?).

Actual Cairns is... oddly like the beach before the end of the world. I went on a disastrous date with an Austrian masseuse called Harald who'd just been stung by an anenome but really wanted to talk about the fascinating fluctuations in the exchange rates ("But that should be like fourteen euros, which is crazy...").

The gays of Cairns are co-dependant hairdressers and trolley-dolleys, clutching their manbags, i-phones and fag hags as they stagger around a bar called Sapphire. They want to talk, which is nice. Well, normally their poor best female friend forever has to do the talking while they stare moodily at distant strangers ("Hiyaaa! Oh, I hate her.") or occasionally reveal their Dark Night of the Soul ("Well, I tried being brunette for a week but no one paid me any attention...").

Strangely, implaccably, the bar is run by a very nice man from Nottingham. He says he came here for a quiet time.

It's like a soap opera made for the deaf by the blind. All the evenings have merged into a blur of early Britney blasting out as a smug hyena from JetAir slides his hand across my jeans while Ainslee wails "And he said 'bitch, bring me more ice cream', and i'll do that for him even though he treats me like dirt!', and the JetAir Hyena will wail "You're a prick Ainslee" and spit in her drink and then turn to me and scream "I am such a whore!" and I will go home and sit on the balcony and read Agatha Christie.

Oh. The Barrier Reef was nice.

The Lair of the Grey Fox

So. Brisbane. It rained. And rained. And rained.

At some point we gave up on our plans. There was going to be a mountain with a lovely view of... the rain. There was going to be a tropical island with beaches. In the rain.

We brought umbrellas and trudged to see a morning matinee of Star Trek. Rain poured through the cinema ceiling. Afterwards, I went and slept in my room. Tim walked around some museums. It rained.

The first night, we'd gone to one of Brisbane's 2 gay pubs. Called the Sportsman it looked like 79 CXR would look if it held a pub quiz night. Lots of fat old men thinking. We stood on the rain-soaked porch while I tried to smoke under an umbrella. Miserably, we trudged back to the hotel. Oddly, wherever you are in Brisbane, where you want to be is up a hill. The driving rain did not help.

The second night we went to a place called The Wickham. There was Drag. But it was Australian Drag, so a man in a dress mimed an interminable song about cunnilingus to a nearly empty bar. Because everyone was outside. Smoking. In the rain.

Two lesbians had a play fight. The bored security man stepped in to try and separate them, and then wandered off, bored.

Tim and I looked at each other. Our looks said "This is awful. Let's go home."

And then we met The Grey Fox. Well, he asked me for a cigarette and I gave him my heart.

Imagine Crocodile Dundee's slightly younger, butcher cousin. Working as a race car mechanic. And somehow having so many muscles they poked through four layers of clothing and a rain coat.

The Grey Fox was out drinking with his best gay friend. Who was 20 years younger than him. It was like a gay Owl and Piglet. (Hmmn. Fox. Owl. Piglet? The animal similes are a bit much).

Anyway, they took pity on us. Or, at least, they took us to a gay club. In the distance was a dance floor. Piglet got Tim drunk and they chased each other round the dance floor.

And the Grey Fox and I went and stood outside, smoking under a sun shade. Around us, the young gays of Brisbane called each other "bitch" and stole Marlboros off their fag hags.

"The twinks are so fat nowadays," sighed the Grey Fox. "Last five years, they've got beer bellies. It's really sad."

I looked. He was right. I suddenly felt less like the fattest gay in Australia.

He continued. "It's like they've stopped trying. Now it's the young straight gays who go to the gym and dress well. If you want to pick up hot guys, you've got to go to straight bars and find a gay guy who is dressed like a straight gay dressed like a gay guy. It was easier in the 80s."

We nod and sigh and smoke another cigarette.

Inside, Piglet is showing Tim pictures of his boyfriend (a Doctor) and their pets. They are drinking more. There's even some dancing.

Outside, the rain pours down.

And the Grey Fox and I kiss. This is very, very exciting.

"Would you like to come back to the hotel?" I ask.

He shakes his head. He has to drive Piglet home. This is at 2am after half a dozen scotches. Yup. The Grey Fox is so hot, he makes drunk-driving sexy.

He smiles. "You can see me on Friday," he says. "We can spend the whole evening together."

Up until this moment, I had been incredibly excited about leaving Brisbane and spending 32 hours on a train to Cairns. Now I'm gutted. "I can't," I say. "I'm leaving tomorrow."

And the Grey Fox smiles. "Let's have a last drink, then," he says.

And we go back inside.

Later, Tim and I walk home through the rain. He is shouting at me. "You could have left me!" he screams, "You could have stayed on! You could have caught a plane! He was worth it!"

I mutter something about how it's sometimes nicer to just kiss a stranger. More enigmatic. More romantic. More classy.

Tim makes a disgusted noise. "You're an idiot. He was gorgeous. How often do we meet men like that?"

Suddenly, horribly, I realise that Tim is right.

And it rains all night.
 

Brisbane

I am in Brisbane. It is raining. Really raining. All I can see are office blocks and rain. The guide book tells me I can go cycling along the river, or snorkelling. But I may just hide in my hotel room. And, in other bad news, Lee emails to tell me that, inexplicably, the Sarah Connor Chronicles has been cancelled. First Bonekickers, now this? Is there no justice in the world?

The bondage cardigan

It's nearly 3am, somewhere in Sydney and three things happen simultaneously:
1) The jetlag kicks in
2) I sober up
3) The taxi passes a gay bar.

I get out and wander in. It's a small bar, but there's still a few people around, and a man on the door. Only he's wearing a rubber waistcoat and a kilt.

"Hum," I say, "Is there a dresscode?"

"Yeah. It's leather. And pvc. And..." he looks at me. "Cardigans are fine after 2am."

"Right," I say and wander in.

It's pretty much empty, actually. But it's a helluva lot better than Oxford St, which was packed with disco damage, drunk fag hags, korean hairdressers, and straight guys trying to bluff their way in to bars so full the smoking areas looked like adverts for Amnesty International.

Correct. It was so bad I'd rather be in an empty pub on bondage night wearing a cardigan.

I've been there five seconds before Australian Poster Boy corners me. He is amazing, and is wearing a suit.

He grabs hold of my cardigan with one hand. "Where did you get that cardigan?" he asks.

"Oh, I got it in Newtown today." I am hoping I sound au fait with the Sydney fashion scene.

He nods. "Yeah, it looks like a lesbian's jumper. Still, it looks great on you. Shall we see if it looks better off you?"

3am. Jetlag. Hot man. Cardigan. Yet, I've pulled in 15 seconds.

"Um," I say.

"You are so English! Love it!" he says, cupping me fondly and popping off to the loo.

Standing behind Australian Poster Boy is an equally good-looking man. Only he's not smiling at me quite so much.

"Hi!" I say, "Isn't that guy amazing?"

The other man nods. "Oh yes," he says, tightly. "We've been together for six years."

"Right," I say. "Sorry. I..."

And he's back. "George!" he shouts, "Look! I got take-out!"

George stares at me. Not a chance. And walks out of the bar.

Australian Poster Boy looks at me regretfully.

"You should probably..." I begin.

He nods. "Yeah."

"It was nice..."

He smiles, and goes to find his boyfriend.

And I am, suddenly, the last man in a bondage club. And I'm wearing a cardigan.

Rugby gang-bang

Honestly, group sex with rugby players is all the rage here in Australia (see here).

Sadly, it appears that:
1) the players involved aren't the prettiest
2) it may not have been all that consensual.

Still. *sighs*

The airwaves and newspapers here are full of coverage that manages to be both horrified and muted - rugby here is such an institution it's like discovering Joanna Lumley likes scat.

Everyone wants to know the sordid details, but no-one wants to know.

On the radio yesterday an advice show had the following nuggets to offer:

"I mean, yeah, she may have been okay with guys one to five, but what if she's not too happy about bloke number six? How should she indicate that?"

followed, oddly, by:

"Well, you know, if you find yourself in a group-sex situation there are a few indicators that you should check for to make sure that it is consensual. A couple of signs to check for is if the girl is tied up, struggling, or crying..."

Over and above all this is a persistent blokiness to the coverage. The main man involved is called Matthew Johns. For years he's been familiarly known as "Matty". Fair enough. But in most coverage he's still referred to as "Matty". When you're deploring someone's actions, it doesn't work so well if you're sticking to his nickname. I mean, "I really can't support what Tigger's done" just rings hollow, doesn't it?

PS: Yes, Australia is fine. So far there's been pirate drag and a lot of ferries, the world's tiniest beach and an ill-advised attempt to go clubbing in a fleece. And we're not going to talk about the jet lag.

PPS: Peter and Katie? I knew it!

Working From Oz

I've no meetings and no pressing deadlines, and only a couple of fun projects to do. So I'm working from Australia this month. Which is a sentence that I never thought I'd be in the lucky enough position to type.

Going through my old guidebooks I found the following, which, once I saw it in a Guide To Sydney For Visiting Businessmen, I just had to keep. And now I share it with you:

Edinbrrrr

Turning up to the festival this year is a bit like arriving late at a barbeque where it's been raining all afternoon. After a month of solid rain, everyone is sodden. Last year was bad enough, but this year the city flooded.

Those young ladies of student theatre are still wafting around in calico slips and flip flops, while the boys still slump around in t-shirts and afghan scarf-ette things, which really can't help. And yet, you can tell that the rain has got into their souls. The flyering is less hectoring, sometimes suprisingly honest.

"Look," said one yesterday, "They've only been getting four or five people in, so it'd be nice if you went," - like a duty visit to a sick relative in hospital. Then the masterstroke: "And you wouldn't have to go back outside, either..."

By the end of the first day, I am soaked. Worse, I'm staying in a £180-a-night kitchen. Some nightmare of modern student living, it's all steel breadbin and giant oven, with a bed cowering uncertainly in the corner. While we dry out over late vodkas, Rick perches on the bed, Kate wedges herself by the pan cupboard, and I perch on the breakfast bar.

We stand outside to smoke. There's nothing explicitly forbidding smoking in the room, but the receptionist cooed "If you plan on using the toaster or the hob or the shower, the smoke alarm is a mite over-sensitive, so could you pop the extractor fan on?" This is a nice way of saying "It'll go off if you even look at a pack of Camels."

So that is why I'm standing in the street at 3am. It has stopped raining, and I'm wearing all that I own that is dryest. Which is a pair of board shoots and a jumper.

Aberdeen

Edinburgh and Glasgow are two of the prettiest cities in the world. Aberdeen was bound to disappoint, but all the same... did it have to be quite so cold and grey and completely lacking in cafes?

There's only so long you can sit in the food court at a shopping mall. Try it. There's a reason they make the coffee so bad.

The real disappointment about Aberdeen was the men. Scottish men are normally 17% more attractive than the English, and neds are on average 24% rougher than chavs. Except for Aberdeen, where the sheer pitiless cold pebbledashes the faces and everyone is constantly eating fried food with the bored docility of cattle.

There's a harbour museum with a model of an oil rig.

Brilliantly, holiday

A night train from Euston tonight down to Aberdeen where we've hired this castle:

By sheer fluke, yesterday's gentleman caller had actually been there, so I now know top facts like how noisy the ghost is. Wheee!

Scottish borders holiday

Well, that was lovely. The stately home turned out to be statelier than described with our own enormous hise and extensive grinds. There was a lot of food, fireworks, drinking, walking and playing of games. And it was lovely. Except when we accidentally ended up in a stripper bar in the village of Newton StBorstal.
The plan next time is for a castle.

French Connection

There is one gay bar in India. And it's only open on a Saturday.

The reason Club Voodoo goes gay once a week is because it's not the biggest crime going on there.

As we walked in, Rick was separated from me by a throng of Russian female prostitutes.

I tried to order drinks at the bar. A knee landed against the back of my leg. And then started to rub up and down against it. And push in harder. I caught a glimpse over my shoulder of a fat grinning man. Frantically I turned to the indifferent barman, who was pouring "vodka" the colour of piss into our glasses. I was being dry humped by a fat man's knee in a hooker bar while paying through the nose for moonshine.

Rick and I stood there, glancing nervously around.

"R and B gets everywhere," growled Rick.

I saw a lovely man at the end of the bar. He looked very severe, with a shaved head and cruel expression. Rick looked over and tutted, "That's an arms dealer."

"All the same, I'm going to chat him up," I announced, staggering unsteadily across the dance whores.

The arms dealer turned out to be a charming French tourist. He'd had a terrible evening at the bar, being groped by strange fat Indian businessmen. It was all rather unpleasant, but we were getting on very well, considering I was almost too drunk to speak.

Soon, I realised it was time to go home. "I'm drunk. I'm going back to my hotel. Would you like to come?" I asked.

The Frenchman warmly. "I don't understand, i'm afraid."

"Would you like to come back with me?"

"No. Sorry. Do you know it in French?"

"Uh. I'm sorry. The only way I know is from the song... and I can't..."

But I did.

He burst out laughing.

"Oui," he said.

Bombay Jazz

Rick and I found a jazz club in Bombay. It was full of rich India businessmen, and empty of jazz.

Instead, there was a wedding singer. We all sang our way through 'Mustang Sally', 'Sweet Caroline' and 'Come On Eileen' quite happily, paying through the nose for vodka.

It was blissful. "How ironic is all this?" I asked Rick after half an hour.

"Not at all," came the grim response.